


be at my side

by TolkienGirl



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Celestial Being Develops Emotions, Episode: s15e18 Despair, Feels, Found Family, Gen, I read this scene platonically so this fic is gen, Quote: Ah; Castiel. Angel of Thursday. (Supernatural), Spoilers, a tribute, but read if you want to feel sad!, our good good angel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-06
Updated: 2020-11-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 06:01:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27419944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TolkienGirl/pseuds/TolkienGirl
Summary: Castiel does not pray to a god he no longer trusts or calls father. He thinks, instead. Thinks about who he was (lesser), and what he was sent down to be (soldier), and who he has often failed to be (friend). At first he did not wish to love, as the humans did. Then, he reasoned, he did not know how.
Relationships: Castiel & Dean Winchester, Castiel & God (Supernatural), Castiel & Jack Kline, Castiel & Sam Winchester
Comments: 4
Kudos: 26





	be at my side

I

A long time ago, in the garden, Lucifer walked.

The story of the serpent followed; it was easier to understand that telling than to perceive how beauty came dripping lies like honey.

Of course, given the rule of a jealous god, truth mattered not.

The angel of Thursday was not in the garden.

He arrives later.

The world, seen through human eyes, is shockingly ugly. The shape of them: uneven lumps of clay. The stench, the filth, the homeliness. Even death is unimpressive. They can die—these humans—losing a great deal of blood, or keeping it.

When they see angels, they burn because of fear, because of weakness. Not because of wonder.

However they die, they die small.

The angel of Thursday did not plunge towards hell or tarry beneath heaven for the wonder of anything.

He was beholden.

A short time ago, the jealous god disappeared. He turned his back; he became weary; he cared little for his clay-formed humans, or the empty smoke beneath the earth.

Two small boys suffered martyrs’ lives in cheap motels, dressed in secondhand clothes. They were always afraid of dying, even when they looked at their father.

The angel of Thursday did not see them.

He had not been ordered to look.

II

_What is so worth saving? I see nothing but pain here. I see inside you. I see your guilt, your anger, confusion. In paradise, all is forgiven. You'll be at peace._

III

“You’re not hearing me, Cas.”

“I don’t want to eat the Oreo, Dean.”

“The _deep_ - _fried_ Oreo. C’mon, you’re a celestial being. The metabolism you got going on…burn this up in no time.”

“I’m not afraid of calories, Dean.”

“Yeah, yeah. You’re not afraid of anything.”

IV

“It was a different life,” Sam says, rubbing the crease between his eyebrows with the edge of his thumb. “I mean, there were a few years where I was still twisted up about it, between…you know, Jess, and everything that followed after.”

“The apocalypse,” Castiel offers, trying to be helpful.

Sam laughs abruptly. “Yeah. That. Anyway, I’m not sorry to have missed out on education…or a career, whatever that would look like. Not anymore. I used to think I was moving through two worlds, and I could just—jump over, stay in one. I don’t think that now. It’s all one world.”

“Yes.” Castiel considers. “It’s good to understand what we’re facing.”

“I thought I was facing the world when I left home,” Sam says. _Left home_ , in this instance, is another way of saying, _fell from grace_. “But I was only half myself. Living half-truths. And Dean—he was on his own. He and our Dad didn’t even hunt together, for some of it. Can you imagine Dean, all alone?”

Castiel can—he first saw Dean in hell, and will not forget that—but he doesn’t want to.

V

Humans lose a great deal of love, and keep it. Sometimes love, for them, is a newborn baby, squirming and looking up at the sky with eyes that can still see heaven as it is. Sometimes love, for them, is heartbreak, and sometimes it is being crowded around a sticky table, drinking piss-poor beer.

Castiel does not pray to a god he no longer trusts or calls father. He thinks, instead. Thinks about who he was (lesser), and what he was sent down to be (soldier), and who he has often failed to be (friend). At first he did not wish to love, as the humans did. Then, he reasoned, he did not know how.

Time taught him. They taught him. And Dean, whom they all followed, taught him most.

How to tend to the Impala, which is not human but not _quite_ all machine, to Castiel’s immortal eye. How to cook. How to pack a wound to keep it from bleeding out, when you lack the power to heal it.

Not how to fight, because Castiel already knew that.

Not how to lie, because Lucifer trained his brethren in _that_ even after he was gone, by shining and treacherous example.

To a jealous god and a beautiful serpent, Dean’s world is an ugly one. The knees are patched. The boot-leather is worn through.

The cup is empty, and yet the heart overflows.

VI

_You’re my family…I love you, I love all of you._

(But he can never belong.)

VII

He used to think it was difficult to be a father. Difficult to stay. Necessary to leave, if only so the children of your hands could be free.

That was how he understood his own father’s absence. That was what he called _faith_ , when he doubted it enough to name it.

With Jack—

With Jack, it is different. _Forever_ is not a cold and lonely world, an ice floe in the ocean or a star wheeling in the dark. _Forever_ has a simple, human meaning, which binds the heart in blood and kindness.

_Forever, or—_

_As long as we both shall live._

VIII

A long time ago in the garden, man fell.

But there is one man by whom Castiel judges all other men, since he knew him first.

Dean Winchester keeps getting up again.

He will survive.

IX

He can never belong, if belonging means perfection, precision, and the calm of eternal life. Humanity, of course, has none of those features. It is the crack in the chassis, and so is Castiel.

_Everything you have ever done, the good and the bad you have done for love. You raised your little brother for love. You fought for this whole world for love. That is who you are. You're the most caring man on Earth. You are the most selfless, loving human being I will ever know. You know, ever since we met, ever since I pulled you out of Hell, knowing you has changed me. Because you cared, I cared. I cared about you. I cared about Sam. I cared about Jack. I cared about the whole world because of you. You changed me, Dean._

The angel of Thursday dies happy.


End file.
